The Fire

Chapter Twenty-Six

Present

Seeing Millie again was awkward on my part, but we didn't talk about what had happened two nights prior. We both stared curiously and in disbelief at the back of Katie's head as we followed her out of the front doors, glancing a look sideways at each other with a half-smile, half-grimace etched into our face. I had always envied Katie, even though I'd only hated her after she got together with Josh. Watching her now, I understood why. She walked with confidence and purpose with every stride she took. Her head held up high without a sliver of self-doubt or self-consciousness. Watching her closer, I sensed something. Something off. Something was different about her. She was too...happy. In my presence, she was always overly cocky and confident, but this seemed genuine. Too genuine, in fact. My eyes drifted to Millie again, she was frowning. Seemingly as confused as I.

We should've turned back.

We should've changed our minds.

Because what we were about to do would change us forever.

And one of us wouldn't make it out alive.

Katie's house was just a short walk from the University. She lived alone; she had moved as soon as she turned 18. It was small, a semi-detached house on the outskirts of town. Nonetheless, it was beautiful. Tangled branches of vines crept their way threateningly towards the upper windows, daring to free themselves from the wooden restraints fixed to the white-washed wall. The windows were slightly clouded, and the door made of solid oak. Katie led us to it while fishing her keys out of her coat pocket with a jingle.

She unlocked the door.

I spoke to Millie for the first time.

"After you," I said with a small hand gesture.

She offered me a smile as she stepped over the threshold after Katie. I held the door with my left hand as I stepped over the doorstep myself. My eyes surveyed the hallway as I shut the door behind me, and it shut with a click. I tried to grab a glance upstairs, but we were both ushered into a doorway to the left which led to a kitchen; modern, but small. The surfaces were pristine and unnervingly shiny.

Millie and I pulled out two of the hip-high black stools of the four that circled the island and dumped our bags under the table while Katie wandered over to a cabinet and pulled out three glasses.

"Drinks, ladies?"

Everything was so awkward.

"Uh...yes, please." I tried to say politely, although I had no intention of drinking anything nor staying long enough to drink it. Katie turned to Millie, she nodded with pursed lips.

Katie didn't give us a choice of drink, but instead just poured cold water from the fridge into each glass. She placed two of them in front of us and sat opposite us on the table.

It was silent for a few seconds minus the sound of Katie sipping on her water.

She opened her mouth to speak, then shut it again, then opened it again.

"Look," she began, "I-I don't even know what to say to you. Sorry doesn't seem like enough."

"Nowhere near," I muttered under my breath, she heard me.

Surprisingly, she laughed. "I know, I know. But truly, I am." I looked up from my comfortable view of the table and looked dead into her eyes. "I don't need your forgiveness. I'm giving you an apology and it's your decision whether or not you accept it."

The words didn't sound like hers. They sounded rehearsed. Fake.

I didn't reply, and Millie continued to hide in her safe blanket of silence.

Katie took a deep breath. "Josh loved you very much. Even when we were together, he never failed to keep talking about you." A quick flash of anger crossed her face but disappeared in a heartbeat. Had I even seen it?

So, Josh did speak about me to Katie, but maybe just in the way someone mentioned their friends in an everyday conversation, sharing memories with someone else they loved. Or maybe it was in the way part of me wanted it to be.

"Please, Sophie, give me something here."

I thought about what she wanted me to say for a moment. Then decided I would say what I wanted to say: what I needed to say.

"Josh was always there for me. Even after we broke up, we were still so close. He was there for me in a way that no one else was and no one else has ever been." I was talking to my lap now. "When you and him got together I was scared we wouldn't talk...he was distant for a while but then he came back to me. I never hated you more than in those couple of months." I took a deep breath. "I'm the reason he died, Katie. If it weren't for me, he would still be sitting here now, and everyone would be happy." I looked up and looked at Katie whose face was the picture of confusion. "You wouldn't understand, and I can't explain, but I am to blame for everything. I wish I could say sorry to him, to you and you Millie." I turned to Millie. "I've been avoiding you to keep you safe; death seems to follow me wherever I go, and I didn't want you to get hurt, but I think that hurt you even more."

They both looked utterly confused but didn't question the tears in my eyes and the wobble in my voice. I sniffed to block off the tears. No one knew what to say.

"I still fully don't understand why we're here," I asked as politely as I could manage.

But something switched in Katie's face. Her eyes lit up and the left corner of her mouth twitched. She leant back in her chair and folded her arms across her body. Her eyes turned to a menacing glare and her perfect features contorted into a smirk.

"Oh Sophie, Sophie, Sophie," she sighed, shaking her head with a sly grin etched into her face, "you really are something else." She rose from her chair and casually walked round to the side of her chair to bend over and place her elbows on the island and her chin in her hands. Her eyes flickered back and forth between Millie and me. The silence was unnerving, and my teeth clenched in anxiousness. What was going on? This wasn't right. Millie's head span round to look at me but I had nothing to say to her. It was like someone had taped my mouth shut.

"Why so quiet?" She continued, "You wouldn't even take a breath when you were blabbering on about Josh five minutes ago." She made a talking mouth motion with her right hand.

"Katie, what are you doing?" It was the first time Millie had spoken. Her tone was full of concern and anxiety.

Katie blinked once but stayed silent. Just staring at us with a look of mischievous glee.

I saw a shadow creeping down the hallway that opened up to the left of Katie. She had noticed my focus shift and tilted her head in said direction. Her expression didn't change. Her head returned to face me and cast me a pitiful expression, crafted with deceit. I could hear Millie's shaky breathing to the right of me, and I leant into her a little, so my shoulder brushed against hers to remind her that everything is okay.

The footsteps approached and a figure turned the corner.

It was him.

The man I had believed to be dead.

Josh Stevenson.